Disclaimer: Don't own.

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Relish

-Chapter 7

The walk to his town house was fairly short. When they approached his front door, Inuyasha released his grip on her elbow to sift through his ring of keys. The woman took this chance to examine the exterior of his house. The small overhang, which created his porch, dripped at the edges where the gutter hung loose from wear and tear. Tall bushes outlined the concrete steps to his door looked trimmed and in pristine condition with drooping yellow and white flowers from the rain.

"He must obviously have a caretaker." Kagome just couldn't imagine him on his hands and knees planting pretty things to surround his house. That brought a small grin on her mouth.

When they entered the foyer, Inuyasha motioned for her to stay by the door. But the girl was too preoccupied for that to stick in her mind long enough. His house, though cluttered with random odds and ends, was fairly clean and breathtakingly beautiful. The inside was outfitted in a sort of ancient cottage appearance; wooden floor with oriental rugs draped on top gave a wealthy guise to the place. The lack of family pictures surprised her a bit, but with the bountiful amount of paintings, artifacts, swords, and more than one katana there seemed to be no room left.

Kagome directed her gaze upwards at the ceiling to see it also made of wood with a translucent skylight in the center, which would allow the observer to take a peek at the blue sky on clear days.

So caught up in the interior of Inuyasha's house, the woman almost didn't hear the man's angry reprimand, "Hey! I thought I told you to stay by the door," he growled. The raven-haired girl almost jumped out of her skin and whipped around to meet very irritated golden eyes. "You're dripping shit all over the floor, wench!" He shoved a red towel towards her.

Well, she was going to compliment the style of his home, but now…Kagome yanked the offered towel from him and being to dab herself dry. "Excuse me, but last time I checked, water was not someone's excrement. Or else, I evidently didn't get that memo." Her cinnamon gaze flicked over at the hanyou as he scowled and leaned against his couch. Meeting her eyes, Inuyasha grumbled, "So this is the thanks I get for bringing you into my house and getting you dry."

This stumped her. Again. How was it that he could keep doing that?

The man noticed her slow the process of drying as she stared at him curiously. "Well…" She licked her lips and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. Inuyasha took in the sensual way her wet hair fell about her shoulders and the adorable fashion in which errant curls stuck to her flushed cheeks. The hanyou didn't notice his feet's movement until he was inches from her form, but even then he didn't make a move to create the distance between them again.

Her scent wafted up from her damp skin and enveloped his sense of smell completely. His breathing became heavier with each inhale; the woman's aroma like an inhalant, addictive but faintly sweet.

Kagome's brows knitted together in confusion when the man suddenly took a large step towards her, diminishing almost all space between them. His close proximity was making her head spin, and she couldn't for the life of her remember what they were talking about. Swimming in his golden gaze, Kagome felt warm and tingly as she lost herself. Somewhere in the back of her mind, the woman noted that the man before her was leaning in gently towards her lips. Despite her situation, the woman's mind conjured up a single thought that broke whatever spell came over her. "I can't seem to ever recall becoming dizzy when Hojo was too close…"

Whoa, what was she doing? Kagome stumbled backwards and dropped the towel she was still holding in the rush to build room between herself and the hanyou in front of her. Finding it hard to catch her breath, the girl panted and met the man's equally surprised and confused eyes. "What—what just happened?"

In effort to create noise in the awkward silence that followed, Kagome looked nervously at her bare wrist and judged the time from the small hairs on her arm. "Uhm, well, it's getting late…" She bit her lip and looked back up to see him checking his own, real watch. His Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed and the woman watched as he rapidly met her eyes again. Neither said anything for a while, so Kagome picked up the fallen towel and haphazardly folded it. Setting the towel on a tiny, cluttered table, the woman made her final move to leave and gripped the doorknob.

"Uh, wen—Kagome, wait." The raven-haired girl stopped at the sound of his voice, more specifically, the sound of her name coming from his lips and turned to find him running a hand through his silver hair.

He had tactfully averted his gaze to avoid seeing any kind of rejection and coughed to clear his throat, "Uhm, you could stay, for dinner. That is, if you're hungry…I don't know if you like oden, but if you want…you could have some, and…uhm, I guess I'm just wondering if you'd have some with me, not like a date or anything…just dinner—"

"Inuyasha," Kagome didn't realize when she had suddenly gotten close to him again, but the woman was there, centimeters from him and stifling giggles that had threatened to interrupt his little rambling. Was it really that possible to be cute and a jerk all in the same day?

Laughing, she reached up and cupped the hanyou's cheek to get his attention. "You had me at oden."

--

As the two entered the kitchen, making nothing but small talk about how wet Kagome had gotten herself ("So sorry, your majesty, but I didn't have an umbrella!"), the girl asked her host if he could cook, "I just didn't think of you as the cooking type."

Inuyasha snorted at her question, "I don't, wench. Well, not many things at least." Ignoring the scolding about the nickname he had given her, the man continued while pulling a box of tupperware out of the fridge, "this is just left over from what my neighbor made me for my birthday." He popped the lid and spooned servings into two bowls and promptly stuck them in the microwave to heat up.

"Oh," at a loss, Kagome stumbled to keep the conversation going, "Well, that was nice of them."

"Her." Inuyasha corrected.

"What?" Kagome queried.

"My neighbor is a she." He didn't meet the woman's gaze as he pulled out the steaming oden from the beeping microwave and slipped one bowl into her hands.

"Ah." The raven-haired girl was surprised to feel a sort of envy for the woman who was Inuyasha's neighbor. That, and being close enough to him to know his birthday! Kagome almost blushed at her thought process. Who was she to envy anyone? Sheesh! She needed to pull it together. It's not like she was his girlfriend or anything.

Realizing that she was just standing there in the middle of Inuyasha's kitchen like a ditz, the woman rushed to take a seat at the table across from him. "So, uhm…what's her name?"

The hanyou looked up from his bowl with a mouth full of suji* and grunted, "Hm?"

Kagome out right laughed at his expression and grabbed a napkin from the stock of it on the table, wiping away some broth off of his chin. "Messy, messy!"

Inuyasha swallowed and meekly took the napkin from her and cleaned the rest of his chin off. "Well, that was embarrassing."

Still giggling, the woman blushed at the look he was giving her. It was curious and warm with a half smile curving on his lips. Setting the dirtied napkin down, the man crossed his arms playfully, defining all the lean muscles in his chest and arms. "You can stop laughing now, wench." He raised his eyebrows when all she did was laugh harder. The hanyou narrowed his eyes and huffed in an impatient manner, "Jeez."

"S-s-sorry!" Kagome took a deep breath to help keep her giggles reigned in and returned to her oden.

After a few moments, the woman noticed that his gaze had never lifted. Now it was her turn to look up questioningly…minus the mouth full of food. "What?"

He sniffed, seemingly nonchalant and resettled himself in his chair. "Just wondering what you had asked," he cleared his throat, "before I had to use a napkin."

"Oh!" with a look of realization, Kagome continued, "right, well…I wanted to know what your neighbor's name was." The woman blushed at the thought of being caught in her small, very, very small feeling of jealousy. "Just curious," she added.

"Hm." Arms still crossed, Inuyasha speculated, "what's the real reason why you wanna know?"

Holy crap, could this guy see right through her?

"J-just curious!" Kagome lifted her hands in a gesture of peace, now completely nervous about being found out.

He snorted again and tapped his nose, "I can smell you, you know."

Darn. She smiled sheepishly. "Well, you don't have to tell me if you don't want—"

"No, no," Inuyasha smiled right back with a look of smugness on his features. "I'll tell you anyway." Leisurely leaning back on his chair he spoke, "Kaede's her name. She's been my neighbor and a good friend of mine for about 6 years now." He paused for dramatic effect, reveling in the way anxiousness oozed off of her but loving the way she tried to hide it in the content smile she gave him. "She's only about 3 times my age. Human years of course."

The hanyou almost laughed at how quickly her face fell to confusion and then back to a real content smile. Almost. Shaking his head, Inuyasha stood and took their empty bowls to the sink, "So, don't worry about it. You won't have any competition."

His back to her, he practically felt her ire flow off of her aura in a tidal wave. "What?!" The man smirked in triumph, as he took soap to the dishes.

Kagome was at his side in a second, fuming. "Whatever made you think that, mister?" She poked his chest in irritation. He wasn't looking at her! And to make it worse, he wouldn't wipe that dang smirk off his face. "I am in no way interested in you that way," the woman ground out.

Boy, she was fooling only everyone in the room except Inuyasha.

Taking the clean, wet bowl he handed her, Kagome picked up a dish towel and began to dry it, "Why you would think that just after a stupid one-night-stand I would become so infatuated with you…"

Inuyasha's smirk eased into a smile at her automatic reach for the wet bowl and let her upset discourse fade into the background as he waited until she was done expelling all her distress.

"…jerk-off I have ever heard of…"

The hanyou handed her the last of the dishes and turned to lean a hip against the counter as she kept furiously drying dishes. Was she always this entertaining to be around?

"…and you can take that to court, mister!" Kagome set down the last of his dishes in a 'so-there!' manner and look at the smirking hanyou by her side.

Blushing at his expression, the woman coughed and asked what the time was.

"Almost 11." Folding his arms again, the man gently looked down at her and queried, "Got to go?"

Nodding the affirmative, the raven-haired girl floundered a bit, not really wanting to leave but had no choice as Inuyasha led her to the door and opened it to show the same raining scene they had left not but a couple hours before. Stepping outside, Kagome turned back to say goodbye to be meet with the handle of the hanyou's umbrella.

"Take it."

Blinking up at him, the girl softly took it from his fingers and whispered her thanks. Turning to go, she stopped short and spun back around meeting his golden eyes again asking, "Oh, but…when will I give this back to you?"

Raising a delicate eyebrow, Inuyasha snorted while stepping down to her, "You can come by the club…"

As if he had just stated the obvious, which he pretty much did, Kagome blushed again and smiled up at him. "Okay."

She didn't know what was happening with her, but when she was around this…this jerk, the woman felt all the extremities of emotions. Could she help it?

Maybe not.

But it was possible that he was having the same problem.

Kagome felt his clawed hand slide up into her hair as she stood on her tiptoes and met his lips.

-

*beef tendons

Happy?

~C.V.